took 3 days off next week, which when you are a nurse working 12 hour shifts means that i don't work until march 7th i think!! gotta love my life. since i had to take days off in february being sick i had briefly debated adding those days back on as work days, but...well, i decided that february was a bit of a wash and i deserved a pleasant holiday. will be good for my body to just rest and relax i think. feeling well, still with the lingering cough, so hopefully that will be gone when i return to work again.anchorage will be alive with activities over the next few weeks and i generally try to squeeze them in between shifts. this year i can hopefully enjoy the festivities in peace. above is ms breezy chatterbug, she is quite happy that i moved thier cat tree right by the window. she's had a great time observing the outside world from her new vantage point.
slept in a bit today, but luckily the sun is staying up a bit longer and i was on the trails before 4 and still walking in the light after 5pm. awesome! took the dogs to gasline-powerline-tank today and then saw this light and cruised up to basher trailhead for a few snaps. i'm trying to get myself in bed early tonight as tomorrow there is alot downtown i want to check out and a few other things as well. the fur rondy is starting so that means downtown is the hot spot. last year when i went down there the wind was wicked! hopefully, tomorrow will be more pleasant for the outhouse races and such. i want to get up early and get the girls walked so i can cruise around downtown sans dogs. not that they aren't fun down there and i may just go down there again tomorrow afternoon with the girls. people love dogs! 
there was also an article in todays adn about these owls that are congregating on the coast, which is odd. would love to scope that out and see if i can get a few pictures of owls. they are cool birds but i rarely see them out and about. so excited to get this stay-cation going. 
just finished two nights of work. pleasant co-workers, decent nights. when i do have unpleasant co-workers i just try and remind myself that it is just 12 hours and anyone can survive 12 hours. i remember in south dakota there was this guy nobody wanted to work with. they often put he and i in the pod together. we always did fine, i suspect because i had that attitude about it. other people try to battle it out with people who can be difficult rather than just make the best of a less than perfect situation. oddly, in the end another co-worker "snitched" on me behind my back and it was the guy i had been pleasant to who let me in on what had happened. i didn't actually do anything wrong it just all got interpreted wrong. i had called out sick one night after working with a fever the night before. the third night i called so see if i could switch days and work a day later instead of that one or if there was an oncall available. i wasn't totally sick, but felt it would be better if i didn't work all night. initially they'd said no go so i was chill and figured i'd just tough out work. well, then they called and said someone would switch so i was off and i would work later in the week. that night my then beau and i went to the fair for a bit and i was home early and in bed by 11pm. there it is. so thanks tom for letting me know who "ratted me out". see...it's good to be kind to some difficult people. of course some people are just jerks and then i tend to just get quiet and stay out of thier way. i do hate tiptoeing around crazy people though.
chatted for a bit with my sister today, that was another reason i started later than normal on my walk. it's been awhile since we chatted which is more unusual for us so it was great to catch up. i had been sick, she has been busy with grandkids. she has 6 kids so that life is always in go mode. they are all grown and on thier way to adulthood, but that doesn't mean less busy. her oldest is in the middle of moving to a new house and preggers with number 5 herself so my sister helps when she can. chatted with another sibling the other day as well, tom (i have 5 brothers). anyway. in the morning i popped onto facebook before crashing and he posted a response to something another brother had posted so i posted back a hi since we were there at the same time...so he called.it is fun to catch up with family when i can.
blossom is barking at some unknown threat in the neighborhood. from her viewpoint on my bed she can see all. she is my security detail, i call rio the back up plan. rio may be blind, but at 120 pounds she can appear quite imposing. as long as i don't post a sign that lets on to her disability i figure if someone looked in and saw that face they just may think twice about robbing the place. saw some blip on tv where people had set up camera's in thier houses while they were at work to see what they dogs did while they were away. of course, i'm sure my dogs are perfect angels, but there is the occasion where the trashcan has been raided or the leftover dirty dishes have been relocated from the sink to the floor. i think blossom is the main culprit of the counter surfing, but i know rio has got a powerful sense of smell and she can easily be moved to investigate. the kid next door has been good about checking on them when i'm at work they got missed yesterday, but they do fine, just nicer to have a check. 
the girl who took the moose shot of the moose in the hospital wasn't aware of it being posted on facebook nor is she even on facebook. not sure i've ever just taken an email picture and posted it on facebook. seems like that would be something you would ask permission of. once it was out there it was fair game. not sure she was too happy though. i am happy though that she did get credit on the newspaper article. it was a fun picture and one that was fun to be able to share. 2 weeks from now it wouldn't have been as cool. some pictures are just of the moment. she isn't a professional photography though honestly so many people in alaska at least fancy themselves professionals or are professional wannabee's. 
for me hobby. i suppose if i got that once in a lifetime photo, but then again. photography is fun for me. when you change something you love into a career you risk making it work. so often you hear that if you have passion for something you should turn it into your career. i think there is pressure for that. it's just our society. it's so money driven. you are good at that...therefore you should use it to make money. i'm not saying there is anything wrong with that, just that one must be careful to not work the passion out of the passion. i remember watching elton john in concert a few years back and before he played, "crocidile rock" i think it was he mentioned that he'd gotten totally burned out on it several years ago, but people want to hear it. i'm not saying he regrets his career, it's been wonderful to him obviously, however, he was passionate about singing and writing and now he kinda has an obligation to sing those old songs over and over. i'm sure there have been days when he'd rather write some new stuff and play that. at our concert he seemed to change things up a bit here and there to keep his own interest. you do wonder about that though. i mean does he miss those old days in the clubs just playing whatever and having a blast. 
with photography i know you can get so busy with the prep work and promotional stuff that you start to have less and less time to just go out and take pictures. when you do stuff for a living it's often the case that even if you enjoy your job you may not want to immerse yourself into it on your time off. like me. nursing is my career and lots of nurses do volunteer work in nursing related area's. me, i pick up trash or cut up dead otters. my dad was an accountant/cpa, it got to a point where he just refused to deal with the home finances. so much in life is about balance and finding what works. it's nice to have hobbies that you just enjoy and not feel pressure to make them your career even if you feel passion for them. 
my friend has surgery and so she can't use a massage appointment she'd scheduled...she also gave me a gift card to get a massage so next week on my stay-cation i can look forward to a spa day for myself. okay not a spa day, but a spa hour will be wonderful. thanks sharon...heal fast!!
rio was enjoying some smell up there on the trail. i had left the house before i realized she was a naked mastiff. i remove her collar at home because of all the neck skin folds she has. if she wears a collar all the time she can get like a hot spot where the skin is forced into a fold. we were a bit later getting started then as well because of a return trip to the house for a dog collar. oops!
blossom happily chased the tennis ball. it gets temporarily lost in the deep snow at times, but she's pretty persistent. she can sniff it out under the snow and we haven't lost too many tennis balls this year. it's been 20's-40's even. i keep waiting to see a bear roaming about due to our warmth. sunday i think karen wants to join me at my secret fur rondy dog sled race watching spot. hope it's a nice day. it's a pretty spot for watching the races. 
i am also excited for the native craft fair they have at the dimond mall. i love that the native crafters gather there themselves to sell thier crafts. often they sit at their booths working on various projects. fun to chat with the artists. so many come in from the various villages. it's just cool. again, i think i've missed this the past several years due to work. dang work...always getting in the way of fun stuff! 
my friend marcia dropped me an email and mentioned that our 30th reunion from our high school graduation is coming up this summer. nothing like a reminder like that to make you feel old!! hehe. won't make this one. went to the 10th, but being up here it's not that easy. besides, i am working on all my fun summer plans! sent off requests for various days off to accomadate the fun stuff we do up here in alaska when the sun is shining. kayaking over memorial day weekend, a cabin at a basecamp of denali over solstice, cabin adventure at byers lake with my neice, a week camping with walrus, possible some other visitors....it's gonna be a busy and fun summer! see why we need so many months of winter!
gotta get back to working on the plane portions of our trip to round island this summer. i have permits in hand. yippee!! will have to locate the dog sitters for all this summer fun too. that is the toughest part. i sure miss them when i'm gone. hopefully we can do some roadies this summer. tent camping with the dogs is pretty fun!
this week off will pass too quickly. bummer. think i'll head down and look at my fur rondy planner and make some decisions. bed races at the ski place in town, outhouse races, snow sculptures. those are the hopes for tomorrow. 
nice to be off the couch again!! 
that is a trail marker. i walk the trails so often i don't need them for guides anymore. often they are color coded though.
did another loop in north bivouac on wednesday and then thursday we just did the bog. 
one moose in the bog yesterday but he was chilling. 
ran into gillian and her doodles, emma and luke the other day at the trailhead. the dogs always get a fun tussle in before we all head our seperate ways. a bit blurry but a fun action shot anyway. guess i shall get myself motivated for a long rest followed by a fun first day of fur rondy activities.
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